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Thursday, October 25, 2012

It’s almost Halloween so a little gore is a good thing,
right?! Plus, it’s been ages since my son and I have done any human body-related
science activities.

Within the last week or two, my son and I have had
conversations about both scabs and white blood cells. This activity is the
perfect complement to those discussions.

We made a model of blood!

Here’s what we used:

4 teaspoons of yellow jello powder

1/3 cup of boiling water

½ cup of cold water

½ cup plus 1 tbsp. of red Perler beads

50 tiny clear seed beads

1 white 9-millimeter pony bead

Liquid measuring cups

Clear glass bowl

This activity came from the amazing book Squirt! The Most
Interesting Book You’ll Ever Read About Blood by Trudee Romanek.

It is chock
full of astonishingly awesome facts about the blood in our bodies, explaining
everything from scab science to blood types (O, A, B, or AB), bone marrow,
leeches, how blood is pumped through the heart, and more. Comprehensive is an
understatement!

While there was a lot that was too advanced for my son,
there was a lot that wasn’t. I simply stuck to the things I knew he’d
understand.

Romanek’s book taught us the “blood basics:”

Most of our blood is plasma, which contains
nutrients from food, hormones, proteins, etc.

Monday, October 22, 2012

Have you seen that commercial from Allstate?
The one with the male (supposedly) French model she met on the Internet? My seven year
old has been walking around the house saying “bonjour” thanks to this little
marketing spot.

To springboard off his new found interest in foreign
languages, I made him a series of four heart-shaped puzzles.Each heart
contains three pieces: the shape of a country, that country’s flag, and the way
you say “I love you” in the language spoken there.

This sweet little game is so adaptable. You can practice
tons of math facts (addition, subtraction, multiplication, etc.), or simply ask
kids to try and slowly tip the board to roll the marble from one odd number to
the next, getting the marble from the top to the bottom row. This is fun at
home and great for the car, too!

Simply save ALL the plastic packaging from FINISH Quantum
next time you buy it. You need the plastic grid cover that holds the tablets in
place and the “bowl” they sit in.

Remove all the cardboard and sticky glue (I used Goo
Gone). Now download the numbers I made, print onto sticker paper, cut out, and
peel-and-stick to each rectangle between the ridges of the plastic plate. Note: The ridges should be sticking up around
the border of each number. I put the numbers in random order.

Glue a thin strip of
craft foam around the interior of the bowl about a 3/4 inch up from the bottom
(I used spray glue). Make sure the space is deep enough to allow a marble to
roll around freely.

Now place a marble in the bowl and the numbered grid
cover on top (numbers facing down). The edges should rest on the craft foam
border you added inside the bowl. REMEMBER:
The marble and the numbers should be INSIDE the bowl.

On the back of the game, run a thin bead of hot glue
around the perimeter to secure the numbered grid so it doesn’t slip out. Let
dry.

Shake-ah, Shake-ah
Subtraction Instructions

Player 1 shakes the game board, muttering “shake-ah,
shake-ah STOP.” He/she pays attention to where the marble stops. This is one
number in their subtraction problem. One more “shake-ah, shake-ah STOP” and the
player now has two numbers. The smaller number is subtracted from the bigger
number and the difference is the score.

Play alternates between players for any number of rounds.
The player with the highest score wins!

Does Your Child
Speak Subtraction?

Before my son and I got shakin’ and played with our
upcycled game, we reviewed some subtraction vocabulary by reading Loreen
Leedy’s Subtraction Action. I love
her characters and my son loves solving the problems sprinkled throughout the
book. (It’s especially entertaining when you read aloud and give Mrs. Prime a
crazy accent!)

Friday, October 12, 2012

Wow. My son's doing the challenge list of spelling words at school. Let's just say this momma got pretty comfortable working on only a few troublesome words a week. Now the entire list is troublesome (a second grader spelling migration?)!! Good thing my son is up for the challenge ... and it's a good thing I am too!My secret-code lovin' boy had a lot of fun with this spelling practice activity. While it took a little prep and a small prize I'd purchased at Target, it was worth the small investment I made. Here's how to get it ready:

Grab 26 index cards and in bold marker write one
letter of the alphabet on each.

Look at your son/daughter’s spelling word list.
What words did he/she miss on the pretest? Pick four of the most challenging
words for secret message spelling practice.

Count each letter in those words (NOTE: if words
repeat letters, count them each time they appear).

The total number of letters is the number of
words long your secret message must be. Get creative!

Once you’ve written your message, begin writing
one word on the back of each letter card so that as the child spells the word,
the message begins to reveal itself. Note: I numbered the words so that letters
from the first word were preceded by a numeral one. If the letter is used more
than once, put the second (or even third word) on a line below the other(s).

EXAMPLE SPELLING WORDS

AcceptStraight

Business

Tomorrow

(

30 letters total in four spelling words)

EXAMPLE SECRET MESSAGE

Spelling is hard and practice is boring. Think hard! When
you spell correctly, a prize is yours. Get yourself something sweet and there
you’ll find a different kind of treat.

(30 words in the surprise phrase)

PLAY

Give the child the index cards and ask that they first
put them in alphabetical order, and then lay them out so each is visible.

Call out the first spelling word to your child in the
predetermined order (remember, you must call the words in the same order that
you used during preparation). Have your son/daughter write the spelling word
down on a piece of paper (1.). When they’ve spelled the word, have them turn over
the letter cards to match what’s written on the paper (2.).

Have them record the words they see and turn the card
back over (3.). Oops! If there’s no word on the back, or no word with the right
numeral (i.e. the number one when you’re on the first word), a spelling error
has occurred. Have your son/daughter draw a line through the word on the back of the cards after they've used it to avoid confusion if letters are repeated.

Encourage your child with clues to correct the
misspelling. Keep going and call out the second spelling word. Repeat the
process until the secret message has been revealed (our message was a clue that led my son to a hidden prize).

TIP

I used pencil to write the secret message words on the back
of my index cards. Simply erase away the old words and it’s time for next
week’s challenge words and a new secret message.

Glue to adhere the scrapbook paper to the back of the
card stock (I used spray glue)

Assembly

Print the cards on card stock. Glue the scrapbook paper to
the back. Cut the cards out.

How to Play

Fraction Match is a modified “Go Fish” game. Deal each
player six cards. Spread the remaining cards face-down (i.e. grass up) in
between the players.

Each player lays their six cards face up in front of them in
a row. If any of the cards represent the same fraction, they should be put
together in one pile. In order for any match to be complete, the player must
have THREE cards that represent the same fraction.

Every match has THREE cards.

Player 1 can either trade a singular card from their “hand”
with an opponent or draw from the grass (the pile in the center). Note: Cards cannot be traded if a pile of two cards has
already been started by the opponent (for example: ¾ and a pie with three of the four pieces
colored in). Only single cards can be traded.

When a player has all three cards that make a fraction match,
the pile is turned over to reveal the grass on the back of the cards.

Play continues back and forth between players until all
the cards in front of one player have been matched, the piles have been turned
over, and are therefore, all grass side face-up. This player wins!Looking for a great book to pair with this activity? Read Loreen Leedy's Fraction Action! My son loved this book and had fun answering the word problems scattered throughout.

Thursday, October 4, 2012

When my son came home from school with math homework that
asked him to estimate the weight of objects, judging which was heavier, I knew
it was time to make a DIY balancing scale. This idea is brainchild of Quirky
Momma Deirdre Smith, aka JDaniel4’s
Mom.

Construction is simple. I used a wire pants hanger from
the dry cleaner, yarn, and two sturdy paper cups. At the two bottom ends of the
hanger, I hung yarn, to which I tied a paper cup (I’d punched holes in the paper cup just below the
rim).

The cardboard tube on the pants hanger kept the yarn from moving along
the bottom of the hanger. Note: Make sure your cups hang equal distance.

Now hang over a door knob and get ready for some math
fun!

My son grabbed lots of small objects. I grabbed a handful
of quarters.

He put an object in one cup and balanced the scale with
quarters in the other cup. We recorded the weights.

1 matchbox car = 4 quarters

1 calculator = 5 quarters

1 LEGO Ninjago spinner = 5 quarters

1 mini flashlight = 6 quarters

1 yoda writing pen = 3 quarters

2 rocks = 3 quarters

Now I asked him what object weighed the most. “Easy!” he
said. “The flashlight!” I asked him how he knew that was the heaviest. “Because
it took the most quarters to balance it.”

“Why not use rocks as a unit of measurement?” I asked. This
required some thought. After a long pause, he said, “Because they’re not the
same size?”

“YES! The quarters are a good unit of measurement
because they all weigh the same. The rocks do not.”

I kept the questions coming. My son was up to the challenge. “If the yoda pen and the 2
rocks both took 3 quarters each to balance the scale, what conclusion can we form?”

“They weigh the same!” he said. We put them in the cups
and, lo and behold, the scale was balanced. The hanger was level.

When I asked my son later what his favorite part of the
day was, believe it or not, our DIY scale was it. I LOVE that my son loves
learning!

Now I picked five of the most challenging words from my
son’s spelling list; I specifically picked words that varied in length.

Now we both added the words, one letter per box, to the
grid on the left side of the game board. Note:
words should not be written diagonally.

Now Player 1 calls
out a coordinate (e.g. D2) with the hope that the opponent has written one of
the words’ letters in that box. Each time Player
1 calls a coordinate, he/she marks an “X” in that space on the right side
of their game board.

If a letter is in the space called, Player 2 says so (and can even indicate the word that was hit or
the letter), and instead of an X, Player
1 writes an O in the box called. Player
2 puts an X through the box that was called as well, covering the letter,
on the left side of their game board. Coordinates that don't hit letters can also be recorded by Player 2 if they so desire.

Play alternates between two players. When the coordinates
for an entire word are hit, the player must announce it. The aim is to call
coordinates that successfully locate all the spelling words.

This is SUCH a fun way to reinforce spelling! Thanks, Jill,
for sharing your genius!

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